CERN Particle Accelerator Achieves New Record by Accidentally Creating a Slightly Better Croissant

Researchers at CERN's Large Hadron Collider announced Tuesday that a routine proton-proton collision at 13.6 TeV unexpectedly produced what French pastry experts have confirmed is 'the most structurally perfect croissant in recorded history.' The croissant, which materialized approximately 0.3 nanoseconds after two lead ions collided at 99.9999991 percent the speed of light, features 127 distinct layers of butter and dough — far exceeding the 55 to 80 layers considered optimal by the Academie Francaise de Patisserie. 'We were looking for evidence of the graviton,' said lead researcher Dr. Simone Boson, visibly shaken. 'Instead, we found evidence that the universe, at its most fundamental level, wants us to have better pastry.' The discovery has prompted what CERN's communications office is calling a 'vigorous internal debate' about whether to eat the croissant or preserve it for study. A compromise was reached in which the croissant was cut in half, with one half sent to a laboratory in Geneva and the other consumed by a postdoctoral researcher who described it as 'transcendent.' Theorists have proposed that the croissant may be a decay product of a previously unknown boson tentatively named the 'pastrion.' Others suggest that at sufficiently high energies, the fundamental forces of the universe naturally arrange matter into laminated dough. 'This is either the greatest discovery in particle physics or the greatest discovery in baking,' said Dr. Boson. 'Either way, we need more funding.'